03 Vibe headlight dimmer switch issue

[Sleeperservice]

Hey everyone, I'm having an issue where intermittently one headlight will stop functioning and this also causes the blue brights indicator on the dash to come on.

FYI The brights do work when I switch them on. If I jiggle the turn signal/switch I can sometimes get the other light to come back on.

I replaced the dimmer switch today, and it seems a little better but then it happened again. Not sure what to check next! Can't really drive it at night right now. Thanks for any help.

[joatmon]

at first I thought it might be the turn signal lever, bu I don't see how that would affect one headlight and not another, as its a common single wire for both headlights until past the lever, and the DRL module.

Since the headlights are dual filament bulbs, one for low beam, a separate filament for high beam, maybe one of the bulbs has one broken filament that is shorting out to the other filament, causing weird stuff.

I haven't had that problem, but I have had a problem where one light would sometimes not work until I banged on the fender lightly , and a new bulb solved that.

[jolt]

Just from past experience with two other different car makes, check the head lamp sockets. I have had bad bulb sockets in the past on two other makes of cars. The sockets have melted inside so that the connections were no good. This seems to be more common as car manufactures go cheaper and cheaper. The outside of the sockets look fine but when testing voltage in the socket, you get 0 volts and on the back side wiring you get full voltage. It may be something else, but I would check sockets to make sure.

[Sleeperservice]

Thanks for the help everybody. It turned out it was indeed the headlight socket, it was melted and charred. I should have checked the easiest thing first instead of getting a switch from the salvage yard LOL. I put some Sylvania Ultras in it too, hopefully that's an upgrade to from the standard halogens. I'm going to keep this 03 on the road for as long as possible!